SERMON IV.

PREACHED GOOD FRIDAY EVENING, 1830.

ROMANS, IV. 25.

He was delivered for our offences.

AMONG the various devices by which affection loves to perpetuate the remembrance of a beloved object now removed from sight, none has been more general, none is more gratifying to the human feelings, than the setting apart certain seasons, in which they are in a peculiar manner present to memory and most particularly, those days, which have formed marked periods in the history of ourselves and families.

The mother will never pass unnoticed the birth-day of her deceased child: the widowed heart can never forget the day when the desire of her eyes was removed at a stroke:" and however present the memory of these lost ones may be

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at other seasons of the year, there will be, on these days especially, a pouring out of the feelings, a yearning of the heart, which almost bursts through the gates of the tomb, and, for the moment, re-unites the mourning friend with the departed. Then will tenacious memory recal with graphic precision, every minutia of the days gone by, and pause on every incident, which the diamond-pin of affection has engraven on her tablets. To these general and natural feelings of the human mind, our church appeals when she appoints particular seasons for the contemplation of those events in the history of our redemption, which address themselves peculiarly to the hearts, and feelings, and sensibilities of the Christian.

At every season of the year, Christ crucified should be the first and dearest object of our thoughts, but surely we awake with a new emotion-we, in a manner, realize the dying agonies of him "who suffered for our offences"

this day which commemorates his death; which commemorates the most awful, most sublime, most heart-stirring event, which even the power of God could perform-the Creator dying for the sins of

the creature.

Oh! let us leave for a while the busi

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ness and the pleasures, the noise and tumult of the world, and follow the procession that moved from Pilate's judgment-hall; oh say, Is it nothing to you, all, ye that pass by?" Is there any sorrow like unto his sorrow wherewith the Lord afflicted him in the day of his fierce anger," when all the sins of mankind were made to meet together, as it were, in our load of guilt; when the "Lord laid upon him the iniquity of us all;" when all the wrath of God against sin, when all the vengeance of justice against transgression, all the abhorrence of infinite purity against the defilement of iniquity, were brought to a focus; all the burning rays of divine judgment brought to one point, and that point hurled against the unsheltered head of him, who stood as the sinner's substitute!

Yes:-" He was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him;" the just one was delivered for the unjust; and he who "knew no sin was made a sin-offering for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." Yes: such an High Priest became us, and such an one alone could offer an atonement commensurate with

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our guilt for he had not, as the Jewish Priests, to offer up atonement for himself, and then for the sins of others; but pure and spotless, the Lamb of God could take away the sin of the world :not only bearing their iniquities," like the typical scape-goat, "into the land of forgetfulness" but imputing to them the infinite merit of his own perfection, of his own obedience unto death, even the death of the cross.

"No man," saith the Lord, "can by any means redeem his brother, or give to God a ransom for him :" and why? Because all that mortal man could offer or could endure, would be insufficient to wipe away one stain of his own guilt; far less could it be imputed to another. But when Jesus once suffered for sins, and bore the punishment denounced by divine justice against transgression, he had no sins of his own to answer for; and therefore all his sufferings, and all his merits were laid up in the treasury of heaven, to be claimed, and applied, and imputed to every repenting sinner. This benefit is to be sought by prayer, and received by faith; but it is offered to all " freely, "without money and without price." It cannot be purchased -like the surplusage of human merit,

deposited in the chambers of imagery of the Church of Rome-with any works, or any merits, or any alms-deeds, or any morality, or any act of ours. The imputed righteousness of Christ is offered freely, and must be accepted as a gift of divine and sovereign grace, with no attempt to add to its perfection by any thing we can do, which would detract from its freeness and its fulness; above all, with no presumptuous attempt to defile its holy purity, by imagining we can be partakers of the gift, and yet continue in sin.

"He

Our faith must be like that of Abraham, (recorded Rom. iv. 20—22.) staggered not at the promises of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded that what he had promised, he was able also to perform; and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness."

"Messiah shall be cut off, but not for himself," said the prophet Daniel, (chap. ix. 24, &c.) "He shall finish transgression and make an end of sin, and make reconciliation for iniquity, and bring in everlasting righteousness. And as Daniel states the object, so, with equal plainness of speech, does Isaiah